The Fedosov family is in crisis. After expanding their mining operations to South Africa, a mob of protesters and reporters gather outside their main building. Alexey Fedosov is in control while his brother, Dmitry, is away. He gives an exclusive interview to one reporter, an American called Desiree Bishop. Desiree knew all about Alexey Fedosov. He was stunningly handsome, with jet black hair and grey eyes the color of thunderclouds. His shoulders were broad and his long legs magnified his already staggering height of six-foot-five. He made all the tabloids and was considered the playboy of the Fedosov family. With a reputation like that, she told herself to stay well away from him. Yet she can´t understand why she can´t keep her eyes off him. How can she be so attracted to him when they have just met? She hates the vulnerability she feels around him and fights her attraction. From their first meeting Alexey felt his body immediately respond to Desiree. The petite blonde was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. But despite her angelic looks, she was tough and shows from the very start that she is not intimidated by him. Alexey tries to convince himself she is just another girl, but soon finds himself confused by the fascination he has for the American. The whole Fedosov family are surprised that Alexey has an interest in a girl that goes beyond the weekend´s parties. And the more they both try to fight their attraction, the more intense their cravings become. 1. Language: English. Narrator: Tanya Stevens. Audio sample: http://samples.audible.de/bk/acx0/047553/bk_acx0_047553_sample.mp3. Digital audiobook in aax.

If The Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk is the best known of Nikolai Leskov´s works outside Russia, that is owing mainly to the opera Dmitri Shostakovich made of it in 1934. Like Soviet critics of the time, Shostakovich saw the heroine as the embodiment of protest against a corrupt and stultifying bourgeois society and therefore justifiable in her actions, if not exactly innocent. To make that reading more persuasive, he eliminated the third and most terrible of her crimes. Andrzej Wajda did not go so far in his film version, A Siberian Lady Macbeth (1962), but he did make the third victim a selfish and manipulative little creature and therefore ´´deserving´´ of his fate. Leskov´s story allows for no such simplifying social explanations. It is a dramatic portrayal of the amoral, ambiguous, elemental force of sexual passion, as intense in its heat as in its coldness. In stylistic directness and narrative concentration, it is unique among his works. He wrote it while visiting relatives in Kiev, where he was given space in the university´s punishment room. He later described how his hair stood on end as he worked on it alone in that unlikely place and swore he would never describe such horrors again. The story, one of Leskov´s earliest, was first published in Dostoevsky´s magazine Epoch in 1865. Please note: This audiobook is in Russian. 1. Russian. Valentin Morozov. http://samples.audible.de/bk/zaot/000058/bk_zaot_000058_sample.mp3.

Letters From My Sister began with a simple letter about a bad job interview or a bad hair day, seeking comfort from hundreds of miles away. One letter plus its response became two, two became four, and four became 120 over the course of a year in which Faye approaches college graduation in Chicago while Eve establishes her career in New York City. Through their correspondence, the Ledermans relate stories and reveal secrets in a way that only sisters can - with a raw openness and honesty derived from a lifetime of shared experiences that surpasses the bond of best friends. By exposing their foibles and fears, each reveals glimpses of real life, both silly and serious. While their stories are personal, the book’s themes are universal and offer perspective on larger issues. The sisters confront their femininity, but they are not confined by it; rather, they use it as a prism to critique many aspects of modern society. As the authors trade beauty secrets and hair removal nightmares, they simultaneously criticize the social construction of female beauty and laugh at themselves for buying into it. Faye finds a Russian waxing woman who nearly renders her bald, and Eve tracks down the eccentric inventor of the ´´Tweezerman´´ that is ´´so precise it can pluck in the dark.´´ Gender roles, career choices and family relationships are all fair game, subject to intense scrutiny, and as a result, hilarity. With a biting sense of humor, the Ledermans laugh long and hard at both their successes and failures. They learn to love their silly, imperfect, and often self-absorbed selves, enticing listeners to do the same. 1. Language: English. Narrator: Emily Bauer, Cassandra Morris. Audio sample: http://samples.audible.de/bk/adbl/020079/bk_adbl_020079_sample.mp3. Digital audiobook in aax.

When an early 1900s love story makes its way from revolutionary Russia to a small town in America, a young girl’s life begins to change. Clara Bradley moves from the city to a remote farming town in Eastern Washington—with nothing to offer a young cheerleader but miles of snow-covered wheat fields. She now has no cheer team and nothing to cheer about. But that move brings her an unusual neighbor: an elderly Russian woman who has a love story she is translating into English. Clara’s love of books draws the two together and she becomes immersed in the lives of Nina and Pasha. ´´Nina sat beneath the tree, winding a bright yellow ribbon through her dark, shiny mane, then wove it all into a long, thick braid. Catching her reflection in the pond, she had to admit she felt pretty. As she filled glasses from a water pitcher, Pasha appeared in the orchard walking toward her. He was wearing a clean white tunic shirt contrasting his dark hair and tanned face. The instant his soft gaze caught Nina’s, her heart fluttered. For the first time, she had an acute awareness that Pasha was not her brother, or even her best friend. He was someone far more endearing.´´ Dawn’s Gentle Light transcends two Countries, two different time periods, and two hearts in need of friendship, hope, and the goodness of God. 1. Language: English. Narrator: Susan J Iannucci. Audio sample: http://samples.audible.de/bk/acx0/100022/bk_acx0_100022_sample.mp3. Digital audiobook in aax.

Now as famous on radio and audio as they are in print, the adventures of that irrepressible and ageless schoolboy William Brown have been delighting both young and old for decades. Perpetually scruffy, mud-stained, and mischievous, he is a lovable scamp whose pranks usually end in disaster, for his harassed elders at least. With friends Ginger, Douglas, and Henry (The Outlaws), and the angelic, lisping, thorn-in-his-side Violet Elizabeth Bott, William has rightly joined the literary, and radio, immortals. This volume of Just William features the following stories: William and the Russian Prince William´s Busy Day William, the Great Actor William and the White Elephants Finding a School for William William´s Birthday William Clears the Slums Parotts for Ethel William´s Truthful Christmas Boys Will Be Boys William and the Ebony Hair-Brush William and the Old Man in the Fog 1. Language: English. Narrator: Martin Jarvis. Audio sample: http://samples.audible.de/bk/bbcw/000243/bk_bbcw_000243_sample.mp3. Digital audiobook in aax.

CIA Officer Karl Adams is undercover in Moscow, Russia, tracking a professor of international relations and geostrategic studies.A series of brutal events forces Karl to escape on the Trans-Siberian Railway toward the Russian Far East, where he must encounter a new threat.Soon, the murder of a passenger puts Karl in the cross-hairs of a brusque old Russian police officer. Karl must now prove his innocence while maintaining his legend as a college grad student. But a new persona presents itself, and Karl latches on to this potential direction.As this train chugs along toward the Siberian tundra, suspects increase with the body count. Karl quickly discovers that all is not as it seems on this normally sedate train ride. Asian powers struggle for ultimate hegemony in this remote setting, and Karl must fight multiple enemies to discover the Siberian Protocol. 1. Language: English. Narrator: Daniel F. Purcell. Audio sample: http://samples.audible.de/bk/acx0/149825/bk_acx0_149825_sample.mp3. Digital audiobook in aax.